The Historiographical Development of the Concept “mfecane” and ...

the dominant discourse, with Farrer capturing the typical attitude towards Shaka
and the Zulu when he described them as savage ‘eaters of the earth’ or ‘eaters
of men’. 30 He was though at pains to point out that the Zulu were no cannibals,
which in his opinion was the worst human condition (see chapter three for a
discussion on cannibals). Farrer and Mann followed Shepstone’s 1875 article in
their respective 1879 publications, including his three-period hypothesis of Natal
history: the “merry Africa” era, the time of depopulation by the Zulu, and the
peaceful colonial period. They believed that inKosi Cetshwayo’s Zulu military
system was precisely the same as that invented by Shaka. Thus the ‘spirit of
wolfish cruelty’, as Mann put it, 31 which was observed at the battle of
Isandlwana in 1879, was seen by these authors and their readers teleologically
as having been present in Shaka’s day. This teleology also applied to the so
called “horn formation” battle tactics of the Zulu used at Isandlwana. Its
invention had been attributed in the literature to Shaka since the 1830’s. After
Isandlwana, it came to occupy a prominent position in all future accounts of the
Shakan military system. Projections on the size of the Zulu state and its military
strength and tactics were made from the experiences of the Anglo-Zulu War,
reinforcing the pre-existing image of the bloodthirsty, cruel and invincible Zulu
military machine. Thus, for writers of the immediate post-1879 period that image
became solidified into fact, as a result of what took place at Isandlwana.
Farrer’s attitude to oral African sources was contradictory. He was suspicious of
what he considered to be an uncritical adoption of oral history. While this may
well have been based on the European “Image of Africa”, which saw Africans as
notorious liars, he was also concerned with finding a reliable methodology for
the analysis of African oral information in history writing. 32
Fynney and Bird presented ideas and information at odds with the established
version of the mfecane narrative. Bird, in Is the Kafir Population in Natal Alien or
Haven, 1896). H.R. Haggard, Cetshwayo and His White Neighbours (London, 1882). 'First
Colonialization of Natal', Annals of South Africa Series, South Africa Handbook, 7 (1901).
'Tchaka the Terrible', Annals of South Africa Series, South Africa Handbook, 10 (1901).
30 Farrer, Zululand and Zulus, 108, 114.
31 Mann, Zulu and Boers, 19.
32 Ibid., 19. Farrer, Zululand and Zulus, 14-5, 108-9, 114-4.
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